I don’t read the Marquis de Sade to beef up on hope for mankind. I know what I’m in for if I pick up “The 120 Days of Sodom.” For the same reason I know what I’m in for when I pick up the daily papers: I can’t be expecting Eckhart Tolle when I’ve been living the American translation of, so far, the 513 Days of Sodom. In that sense, it’d be futile to criticize President Trump for being the Marquis de Trump.
There are differences in the sadism derby though. Sade didn’t dare publish many of his works, or was imprisoned when he did. Trump advertised his sadism in full-page ads in the New York press when, before their trial, he called for the murder of five teenagers accused of raping a Central Park jogger 30 years ago. I say “murder” because that’s what it would have been: they were innocent and were proven so, though only after serving 13 years in prison.
Trump, an admirer of extra-judicial mass killers like the Pilippines’ Rodrigo Duerte, had exercised his First Amendment right to pretend to be judge and executioner for a day. But despite the five men’s exoneration and another man’s confession, Trump called the multi-million dollar settlement a “disgrace” and still judged the five guilty. Evidence means nothing to him.
Nor does limiting his impeccable credentials for sadism to adults. (George W. Bush and Barack Obama did their share of unpardonable crimes against adult undocumented immigrants. They exempted children.) Using that great Alabama humanitarian Jeff Sessions as his conduit, he’s been ordering children of undocumented immigrants separated from their parents at the border, whether the parents are committing illegal acts or not. In one reported case, a child was taken from her mother as she breastfed. In another, a mother and son, 18 months old, escaped Honduras seeking asylum in the United States. Mother and son were separated and detained. That’s how we’re dealing with “huddled masses yearning to be free” now, with what Sessions-Trump call a “zero-tolerance” policy at the border, due process be damned.
Asylum seekers are not criminals. The children of undocumented migrants, no matter their parents’ record or intentions, are by definition innocent. But they’re being separated from their parents and imprisoned in gulag-like detention centers along the border in practices unheard of in the civilized world. As always when children are the victims of an unaccountable police state, brutality and sexual abuse shadow the victims where they go, as the ACLU is documenting in a lawsuit, though we don’t have to go that far to define the mere premise of children’s arbitrary detention as torture. Dress up the jail as a spotless former Walmart with Pokemon posters on the wall and Moana playing on a movie screen. It’s still a prison.
Reporters were herded through one such converted Walmart in Brownsville, Texas, on June 14, one of 100 such “shelters” in 17 states imprisoning 11,000 children. Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon tried visiting the Walmart prison 10 days earlier. He was barred from going in. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE–America’s acronymized homage to Kafka–suddenly had a public relations nightmare to add to the more literal nightmares it was inflicting on imprisoned children. Real nightmares it can deal with: that’s ICE’s specialty. PR nightmares are a different story. ICE got to work prepping the Brownsville prison for prime time, cleaning it up, warning its inmates not to interact with visitors, and invited the media. It briefly reminded me of the way George Pullman would herd reporters though his company town for his workers near a manufacturing plant in Illinois, a Potemkin village of luxury that couldn’t keep up the illusion of brutal repression within. Or you could compare the Walmart-type prisons to the detention camps for Japanese-Americans during World War II, though in both the Pullman and Japanese cases children were never separated from their parents. That special reinvention of an American specialty had to await the Trump era.
Separating children from their parents was a slave-broker specialty, justified then on the assumption that parents and children were property, not human beings. Sessions had as first-hand knowledge as is possible to have these days, when he worked as Alabama’s attorney general in Montgomery and had lunch in restaurants along Commerce Street where just a few generations earlier brokers with names like W.A. Grant, F.H. Bock and Cameron & Benson had lined the way, their signs advertising “Slave Investor/Auctioneer,” their sales pitches boasting of the children’s potential as workers, breeders, and more subtly, concubines.
The zero-tolerance policy at the border doesn’t enslave children but it achieves the same ends: it dehumanizes parents and children and treats both as surplus merchandise warehoused in prisons, without a say, without rights. To which Sessions the Montgomery street-walker had this rejoinder: “If you’re smuggling a child, we’re going to prosecute you, and that child will be separated from you, probably, as required by law. If you don’t want your child separated, then don’t bring them across the border illegally.” That was before he doubled down on rhetorical derangement by quoting the Apostle Paul as legal precedent.
None of it is justified by public safety concerns: neither children nor parents are a national security threat. None of it is legal under international law. But if Trump can ban Muslims from the country on fabricated pretenses, nothing is stopping him from doing the same to migrant children with the wrong skin color. Again, maybe we should not be surprised. Trump is only exercising his cruel and usual inhumanity.
But Congress and the courts are letting him get away with what used to be only a fantasy. We’re days away from the Supreme Court confirming it with its endorsement of the Muslim ban. He now is, in fact, judge and executioner, with the other two branches’ complicity. That’s Trump’s America, where the lamp beside the golden door shows the way to the dungeon for all those who don’t put up or shut up. And we have at least 938 days of Sodom to go.
Pierre Tristam is FlaglerLive’s editor. Reach him by email here or follow him @PierreTristam. A version of this piece aired on WNZF.
Ptc Trader says
Precedent…. pending felons “are” separated from children…. This is a 1996 law as regards immigration. Wake up Pierre. Trump didn’t invent this… he is just enforcing the law.
Edith Campins says
What is gained by separating the children from the parents other than traumatizing the children? Why not keep them together and speedily deporting them?
They know they are taking a risk coming here but their lives where they come from are where they come from so unimaginably miserable they are willing to try.
What we are doing is creating a large group of people that will forever hate Americans and everything about our country. We will reap the consequences.
mausborn says
People need to understand that this is what every single Republican voter gleefully wanted. This is 100% what they voted for.
Brian Riehle says
Pierre…..How about changing your comment policy today and only allow comments on this piece from people who give their real name. ? That would show who has the courage to put their moral convictions out there in public.
BTW …I wholeheartedly agree with you.
Pitching Wedge says
If you take the risk of entering illegally, you take the risk of getting separated. Solution: Don’t enter illegally. Cross at a valid border crossing point and state your case for assylum.
Common Sense says
The republicans love to chant Lock Them Up. Well apparently they have gotten carried away with the whole thing, that now includes locking little children up on concentration camps. And oh yeah….WHERE are the the little girls?? WHAT is going on here? This is not my America. This hasn’t been my America since the 666 and his evil minions took over after they stole the election. Every person that finds this whole thing reviling needs to stand up and say so! Verbally! Often! LOUD!! Don’t think just clicking an angry face on Facebook amounts to anything. It doesn’t.
RESIST~!
Pogo says
@trump policy eliminates the need to choose
maga
Pierre Tristam says
Brian, that would be great under any piece: anonymity is often (not always) a coward’s mask, revealing in its own way (caveat: we have to respect the anonymity of whistleblowers). But we couldn’t impose a different standard on these columns than on other material. If anything, the threshold is lower since it’s an opinion column.
Sherry says
Here’s more fuel for the fire! trump doesn’t even control his own people. Elephant Trophy Hunting is back! Take a read:
http://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/392675-zinke-blatantly-disregards-trumps-opposition-to-horror-show
Pierre Tristam says
Ptc, thanks to my Ikea coffee this morning I was in fact up when I revised this piece for publication, and wish you’d been as well: no one will dispute you on the fact that the 1996 immigration bill was a major Clintonian suck-up to Republican sadism against brown skins, just as the 1994 crime bill was, from this first allegedly black president, an equally submissive suck-up to making predators of every other joint-wielding black skin, but it helps to be specific: the 1996 law, while taking a stand against “smugglers,” said nothing about separating children from their parents. That’s not a law. It’s a Trump-Sessions fetish. And no points for trying: instead of retreading fallacious Fox talking points you could more constructively be cheering on underdog Mexicans bashing Germans at the World Cup. Or is that violating the 1996 law too?
hawkeye says
the parents are doing something illegal,its their fault the families get separated, how hard is that to understand ,and I wont stoop so low as to insult any one ,the way the so called liberals love to do.
Mark says
Sorry Pierre, asylum seekers that cross the border illegally are criminals. Asylum seekers that enter via a port of entry, the proper way, are not criminals. Try entering the legal way, not dragging your innocent children through danger, maybe you won’t be separated from them. Very simple, follow our law.
Mark says
Maybe, just maybe if Congress got together and repealed the Flores Consent Decree things would pan out better for the tots that have been dragged around as pawns in a serious game.
Really says
Gotta be tuned in to to catch the humor in the first part of that article. Lmao
Agkistrodon says
And what of the American Citizens who have children and have also CHOSEN to break the law. What happens to them and their children. I’ll tell you, If they are caught, they are arrested. They are then incarcerated away from THEIR children. So you see we are simply ensuring the same equality for those who enter this country illegally. These illegal children, are also placed with relatives in the US once they are medically screened and processed.Should we set free American who break the law, simply because they have accomplished reproduction? If that is the case, you should ready yourself now, because the results will be horrible. Those are the facts, and Facts trump Feelings.
Anonymous says
Parent’s need to stop using their children for pawns. If you want to come to America, do it legally and there will be no problem. You should not be permitted to stay and should expect to be separated from your children when you disobey the laws and procedures put in place. Those that come here legally and jump through all the hoops must be asking themselves why, if those who think they can make up their own rules and bully their way in works. In the mean time, those of us who are citizens and work for a living are paying for those who are in our country getting a free ride! It’s time to man up, tighten up, and follow the rules…..liberal presidents have been turning their heads for far too long. Way to go TRUMP!!!
Michael Cocchiola says
Today I am ashamed of America. Our disgusting criminal government has gone full Nazi on us. Trump and his ICE Brownshirts are ripping children from their mothers’ arms and hiding them in internment facilities. The parents don’t know why they’ve been taken, don’t know where they are and don’t know if they will ever see their children again. This is abhorrent in a civilized society. It is against humanity. This is not America. This is totally Trump.
Write to your representatives, Talk to your priests and pastors. Do what you can to protest and stop this grievously inhumane behavior.
Robin Polletta says
Thank you for continuing to be a voice of reason in these terrible times.
Beachcat says
Perhaps history does repeat itself.
Hitler began his reign demeaning and threatening the free press.
He then separated parents from children and put them all in concentration camps.
I know you better says
What a load of crap. According to international law these people should be requesting asylum in Mexico not the United States. Just another liberal leftist nonsense attack on our government. We should be just turning 5hem around at the boarder as it is Mexico’s responsibly to give them asylum not ours.
Mark says
Pierre, where were you when obama was following this very same policy?
Anonymous says
Just remember, Trump is enforcing the laws that DEMOCRATS made. You forgot to add how the DEMOCRATS WERE SEPARATING CHILDREN FROM THEIR FAMILIES LONG BEFORE TRUMP!! Do your research before blaming someone for the same thing that was done years ago by Democrats!
Nancy N. says
Every single person here who is justifying this infliction of trauma on little children on the grounds that “a crime” should be ashamed of yourselves. You have no soul. Most of these people have committed at best a misdemeanor (if they’ve committed a crime at all) for which most people do no jail time at all. But we are locking them up for months on end, putting their children in prisons where they can’t even be comforted with a hug and traumatizing them. No one involved in allowing this to occur or implementing this policy is human. They’re all monsters. I fear not just for this country but for humanity itself.
Sherry says
Excellent article Pierre!
Even Melania trump says the policy of separating children from their parents is WRONG!
There are most certainly valid comparisons to NAZI Germany, and to the roots of other dictatorships. Look at the pattern of abuse and manipulation from the “bully” pulpit:
1. Opposition to the rights of the “Free Press”/Favoritism of media access (FOX preference)
2. Consolidation of power to the “Dictator” (PARDONS friends of friends)
3. Condemnation of the “OTHER” (the poor/racism/homophobia/chauvinism/sexism, etc.)
4. Alienation of Allies (Canada, UK, France, Germany, etc.)
5. “Bullying” those who have the temerity to disagree (“You’re Fired!”)
6. Personalized paranoia and belief in “conspiracy theories” by the “Dictator” (loves the National Enquirer)
7. Narcissism and Megalomania of the “Dictator” (stand at attention, like the citizens of North Korea)
9. Admiration of other “Dictators” (Putin and Kim Jung-un)
10. Dictator’s decision making from “feelings/emotion/instinct”, rather than education and intellect.
I could go on and on, but unfortunately for all of us, the parallels are quite clear. Since those in Congress and state houses (and Flagler County) are weak COWARDS . . . we need to clean out the gutter from the ground up!
VOTE for SANITY and HUMANITY in November!
Sherry says
Horrific trump and his henchmen are actually cruelly in DIRECT VIOLATION of the “Convention on the Rights of the Child” agreement found in the UN International Human Rights agreement. http://www.unhcr.org/3d4aba564.pdf
The following words are directly copied from that document. . . take a good read:
This Convention applies to all children, including those
who are refugees or asylum-seekers.
The Convention articulates four basic principles that
underpin the treatment of all children:
• The principle of non-discrimination (Article 2)
• The principle of the best interests of the child
(Article 3)
• The right to life and to survival and development
(Article 6)
• The right to be heard (Article 12).
In addition, the Convention contains provisions that
are of particular relevance to refugee children. It:
• Outlines a number of fundamental rights, including
to protection from abuse, exploitation and neglect;
to physical and intellectual development; and
to education, adequate food and the highest
attainable standard of health;
• Contains provisions concerning the CHILD’S RIGHT NOT TO BE SEPARATED
from his or her parents against
their will, except when this is in the child’s best
interests (Article 9); family reunification (Article
10); and the right to “special protection and
assistance” by the State if the child is temporarily
or permanently deprived of his or her family
environment (Article 20).
• Specifically states that every child seeking
refugee status or who is a refugee has a right
to appropriate protection and humanitarian
assistance in the enjoyment of the rights in the
Convention (Article 22)
Rimms says
Here’s someone else besides Mr. Tristam to comment on:
“Americans pride ourselves on being a moral nation, on being the nation that sends humanitarian relief to places devastated by natural disasters or famine or war. We pride ourselves on believing that people should be seen for the content of their character, not the color of their skin. We pride ourselves on acceptance. If we are truly that country, then it is our obligation to reunite these detained children with their parents — and to stop separating parents and children in the first place.” Laura Bush is a former first lady of the United States.
JimB says
Now I know where all this precipitation is coming from… Pierre and his fellow butthurt snowflakes are having a meltdown! In the words of your treasonous, felonious, murderous she-devil, “he won, get over it” .
Fernando Melendez says
The law is the law, however the separation of child from mother is far exceeding the law. Potential backlash from these actions can be expected. Especially from the legal status Latinos in the midterm elections. My advice, simply STOP IT ! Now
Fernando Melendez says
The law is the law, however the separation of child from mother is far exceeding the law. Potential backlash from these actions can be expected. Especially from the legal status Latinos in the midterm elections. My advice, simply STOP IT ! Now
Makeitso1701 says
Perfect tittle for this article, I would also add “The Devil Himself”.
Wayne says
What’s your suggested solution? We have in place a LEGAL pathway of access and citizenship into our country of rules and laws. If our rules and laws are not enforced, we have a lawless and chaotic nation. That’s grossly unfair to our hard-working law-abiding citizenry. Be proud you’re an American!
Trailer Bob says
There is a legal process to come to America permanently, just as in most other countries. If I overstay my time in Jamaica, I am jailed, al my money taken, then kicked out of the country. Cute how you turn this into a pity story of innocence, when you SHOULD know that breaking the law, like it or not, will get you separated from your children. There is a legal process available and many take advantage of just that. But Pierre, you can always sponsor some of these illegals…seems that would be the right thing to do…no?
Anonymous says
What Hitler did with the radio in Germany, Trump is doing with social media. Hitler did not become Chancellor and immediately build concentration camps. His rise to power and demonization of Jews was incremental and laws were used to start the process. Please google “Hitler’s rise to power” and read the wikipeadia piece. History doesn’t repeat but it rimes. How soon will immigrants have to wear the letter “I” on their clothes? If these families seeking refuge were blond (or orange haired) and blue eyed do you think they would be separating them? This country is on a very scary path. By the way, do you know the German stock market went from 350 to 1,100 during Hitler’s reign?
The most insightful thing I have heard lately was Bob Corker referring to Trump support as “cultish”. It is absolutely true. I can understand why otherwise reasonable people I know voted for Trump. I had difficulty understanding why they still do until Corker’s comment. I can’t think of a better explanation of supporting Trump now than it being a cultish. I am sure if I expressed my view of Trump (even in less stringent terms than above) I would lose friends and customers. For the first time in my memory, people cannot “agree to disagree”. If you aren’t enamored with Trump to most Trump supporters, you are shunned.
Just me says
Keep them together and QUICKLY send them BACK HOME!
Anonymous says
If we don’t take a stand we will be walked on like a door mat! There is a legal way and an illegal way…..just do what is right and there will be nothing to complain about!! We American’s cannot afford to continue to provide services and medical to those that are here in our country when we have American’s struggling and suffering. It is time to get tough and send the message or this infiltration is going to be so out of hand that it is going to be out of control. This is the land of the Free, not the land where everything is free. Thank you Mr. Trump for taking a stand. You are not separating people from their children…they are by bringing their children and using them for a purpose for their own personal gain. Don’t come and bring your children and you won’t have to cry about being separated from them. Just do it the right way….what’s so hard about that? My family did it the right way and so have millions of others that have come to this country. All sneaks need to be sent back to their country–with their kids!
Instigator says
What part of illegal do we not understand? Come in the front door. Don’t try and sneak in the back door. As we have learned in the past few weeks, there are two sets of laws in this country. One for the Democrats and one for everyone else. I have three family members standing in line and jumping through hoops to come here LEGALLY. Why should we permit a mass migration of people into our country without proper investigation?
Funny how Social Security is running out of money but we have all the money needed to fund illegal immigrants and welfare. Send them back to wherever they came from and let them get at the end of the line.
BUILD THE WALL. Wait till the red tide gets here in November.
Richard says
Trump Haters (many commentators here, Pierre included) will ALWAYS be Trump Haters regardless of what is taking place whether it be good for our country and the world or NOT. Everyone is entitled to their opinions good or bad; it’s how one ACTS on their opinions that is dividing this country. Congress needs to step up and get a comprehensive immigration package together which the POTUS can sign into law. However, the left will find fault with it one way or another because it became law under Trump’s watch.
Mark101 says
What I am seeing on the news with this jackass of a President is both disgraceful and without thought or feeling. This action to use just plain Gustopo tactics to separate children from the illegal Parents well is reminiscent of history past. So I guess we brand them next or insert tracing chips in the neck. There is no need even if the parents are criminals to separate the families. These children are no treat. The parent will along with the children be returned to their country together and humanly. But no let’s just lock them all up like rabid creatures of nature. So what’s next we start separating children that are US citizen from a suspected criminal. Our laws can’t even protect a nut from doing harm to a spouse or the children but be damm we are going to use some 1996 law and turn into some retard government and show the world just how primitive the US can be under some child leader. I’ve served as a law enforcement officer in a gang unit in Texas and I’m a 20 year vet but this is just plain disgusting and this reminds me of the cowards i faced in Iraq and Afghanistan where children and women can be and will be used as tools of war but here these children are being used as a tool of politics. Trump this is disgracful
Just The Truth says
Trump is now blaming this on the Democrate’s,once again as he does over and over always blame someone else for something he is doing on his own, because the Democrate’s won’t pay for his wall. The wall he made clear over and over and over again during his campaign that Mexico would pay for the wall. What happen to that Trump, just more of your lies.
Lt. Dan says
Awe, the poor little illegal children. Perhaps we can bring them all here to Palm Coast and let them stay in Pierre’s backyard. He can feed them and cloth them. They can all use his bathroom and swim in his pool. Yea, that’s seems like a real good deal. And our local sheriff can guard them all and hand out candy.
Traveling Rep says
I wish these parents would stop exposing their children to such awful treatment. Perhaps if they would enter our country via the legal route, they would not subject their children to being separated from them. Alas, they apparently do not care enough for their own children to protect them from isolation. It appears to be a form of child abuse by these parents, when you think about it.
We hear all these loony tunes lefties now moaning about the treatment of these illegal aliens that has happening since Obama. Truth is the liberal lefties don’t really care about these illegal aliens or their well being. They do nothing to highlight whether or not these people are truly coming from dangerous situations in their own countries – such as to justify them being allowed into the US under a clause of asylum. They simply imply that they are in danger, with zero facts.
Take for example Nicaragua. Daniel Ortega is currently brutalizing his own people, who’ve been protesting his regime for the last few months – because he has reduced their pension and social security payments. He is literally killing innocent children, women and men by the dozens. Bombing their homes, shooting at them with drive-by squads, you name it.
Curiously, we have not heard one peep about his vile treatment towards these Nicaraguan citizens, and the humanitarian crisis there, by any of the US news media. Why? Because it may detract from MSM’s abject hatred of Donald Trump and his policies of protecting our great country. The only (English programming) news organization I have seen put any real coverage on this matter is Al Jazeera…go figure.
How can any of the MSM/liberal news media be taken seriously when they refuse to show real news free of slant? That includes flaglerjive.
Anonymous says
Those of you who say “the law is the” we must abide by it”, let’s see if you will be singing the same tune when Muller comes out with his findings, that this president, not only colluded with the Russians, but also may have put our country in danger to benefit himself financially. Perhaps you will be and should be chanting “lock him up”.
MR G says
TRUMP 2020 # KeepAmericaGreat.
woody says
Your children can’t be ripped from your and separated if you stay where you are.Go back if you feel you are being treated unfairly.
Laura Howell says
There was a time in America when a man who used children as hostages would be despised as a coward. Now we call him President.
DRedder says
Hundreds of thousands of American Children are separated from thier parents each day . Not one peep or cry from the leftist & socalist .
Where were you when the government does this to Crimminals . Why are you so silent, when our Men & Women Patroits who Serve in the Military are separated from thier children? Ya all a bunch of hypothetical jackass’s.
This program started under Bush II, was actually ramped up with Obummer. But it’s Trump’s fault , ya right. You all upset then bomb your Congress Person and have them Change the Law. IT’S THEIR FAULT & THEIR JOB.
Frank w says
Ha ha ha you bleeding heart librals make me sick. We’re enforcing a law that should be. Don’t come here illeagaly.. period!
Edith Campins says
For those of you who are still justifying trump’s actions:
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/was-law-separate-families-passed-1997/
He is a liar and a bad liar at that. There is no such law, the Obama administration did not separate families.
gmath55 says
All the liberals and Democrats are https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1qQ1SKNlgY
Richard says
What a bunch of HYPOCRITES and Trump HATERS posting here! Children were being separated & locked up in chain-link cages by Clinton, Bush & your favorite POTUS, Obama but that was OK. Now it is NOT OK. Complain to your congressman/woman, both your representatives and senators, to do their JOBS instead of obstructing legislation and stonewalling progress.
Richard says
@Just The Truth – Mexico will INDEED pay for the wall one way or another. They may not be putting up the funds initially to build the wall but the Federal Government will get the money from Mexico through tariffs to equalize the trade imbalance that has existed with Mexico for decades. Same goes for China, Canada and any other country taking advantage of the US. It takes a good businessman with sound business practices to pull this off and Trump is the one that will get it done. If left up to a politician NOTHING would get done.
Mr Chris says
If you look at the past year and a half it’s never been about the issue, it’s always been about getting rid of Trump. Russian collusion? Obsruction of justice? Mentally unstable? He’s going to start WWIII? Now He’s taking the children. If those issues were of such grave concern why were democrats not held accountable for the same exact issues? I can’t wait for the next FAKE outrage issue to try and get rid of Trump and there will be one. The people aren’t stupid and they see right through it.
Sherry says
Refugees are NOT all criminals! Read the UN Agreements! Get educated and get a heart!
Also please think for yourselves, and STOP quoting FOX’s hate filled tripe!
Pogo says
@Sherry
trumpholes need a brain – and a soul. They’ve no place for either – hate radio and Fox ate their brains and souls long ago. Their dear leader (old blood and bone spurs trump) just announced that he has decreed the creation of a new branch of the country’s armed forces to be known as the United States Space Force. The Pentagon says they’re studying it. They could have pointed out the fact that the USAF already has a major command devoted to space: Air Force Space Command (AFSPC), sometimes referred to informally as U.S. Space Command.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Force_Space_Command
Why don’t the generals correct an obviously confused, senile, and dishonest trump? They’re the training wheels and brakes on the idiot’s bike and they can’t help anyone if trump purges them. A monster loved by monsters is carrying us all to hell as fast as he can peddle – while the trumpholes laugh and jeer. Ha Ha
Common Sense says
Arguing with a trumper is like arguing with a four year old. Exactly. They cannot be reasoned with, shown actual facts (not FOX facts, not trump facts..but REAL facts.) They don’t care about real facts. The trump cultists are rearranging the deck chairs while the titanic is sinking and laughing and toasting each other. I find it totally a waste of my time to argue with these poor deluded souls. However, I will do everything in my power to help to rid out country of this cancer called the trump administration.
Thanks for the Snopes…but they don’t bother reading Snopes. They call anything that doesn’t agree with their swiss cheese thinking fake news (because Dear Leader says so.)
We have to remember that most of these trumpers are good people, they are just completely and totally brain washed. I have no idea what it will take to wake them up….before this titanic sinks and it’s too late for everyone.
For those of you who are still justifying trump’s actions:
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/was-law-separate-families-passed-1997/
He is a liar and a bad liar at that. There is no such law, the Obama administration did not separate families.
Richard says
@Common Sense – I suppose you are also claiming that Kirstjen Nielsen is lying when she spent 20-30 minutes explaining REAL facts to the press corp at her latest WH press briefing in regards to whats been happening at the border. Frankly I would call Barack Obama one of the biggest liars to sit in the WH after what he did to the American people with his Affordable Care Act AKA Obamacare and the most recent discovery of spying on an opposing campaign in a presidential election plus way TOO many to list here. There was absolutely NO transparency within his two terms while president versus what you see and hear in Trumps current term as president. I will trust a businessman far more than ANY politician who is trained early on in their political career on how to lie, cheat and steal along with being corrupted by other political members along the way.
Sherry says
To those who call President Obama a liar. Remember those glass houses? Let’s look at who the actual liar is here.
A whopping 69% of the statements trump makes are down right lies! A full 15% are considered “Pants on Fire”, 32% FALSE and 22% Mostly False. This from Politifact:
http://www.politifact.com/personalities/donald-trump/
While measured on the same scale, President Obama scores 2% “Pants on Fire”, 12% False and 12% Mostly False.
http://www.politifact.com/personalities/barack-obama/
RayD says
Same as jack booted Nazis during and before WW2. Goebels would be proud.
Sherry says
Regarding the lies of ole Kirstjen. . . here are just some examples:
She lied when she said that it was not intended as a deterrent to undocumented immigrants (her predecessor John Kelly, now chief of staff, described it as a way to “deter” parents from crossing last year). Nielsen depicted many of the “parents” crossing the border as smugglers, claiming that the number of “family units” consisting of a child and a smuggler, rather than a parent, jumped by 314 percent in the last five months. The Washington Post’s Philip Bump found that, while it’s true that the number of “individuals using minors to pose as fake family units” jumped from 46 in fiscal year 2017 to 191 in the first five months of 2018, that was out of 31,000 families. Which means that for every 1,000 families crossing the border seeking asylum, six included someone with a criminal record—whether smuggling, trafficking, drug dealing, or something else—using a child to press their claim; 994 did not.
Nielsen also insisted that detained children can call their parents (most cannot) and that they are being carefully tracked and well tended (lawyers, parents, advocates, and lawmakers who’ve visited the children say that’s not true either). The president of the American Academy of Pediatrics was told she could not hug a crying child; a former detention-center staffer turned whistle-blower said he was told not to let siblings hug each other. In one facility, a detained teenager was in charge of changing a toddler detainee’s diapers. “Once the parent and child are apart, they’re on separate legal tracks,” former ICE director John Sandweg told The New York Times. In fact, detained parents have no idea when, where, how—or even if—they’ll get their children back.
“Literally everything she said was a lie,” a still-stunned Representative Pramila Jayapal told me by phone Tuesday morning. Asked to choose one outstanding falsehood, she quickly replied: “Well, the children being detained are significantly younger than Nielsen said.” Just last week, the Seattle congressmember met mothers in detention who’d lost children as young as 1 year old.
capt says
Lets not forget what President Obama said in his 2013 State Of the Union speech about immigration
“” Our economy is stronger when we harness the talents and ingenuity of striving, hopeful immigrants. And right now, leaders from the business, labor, law enforcement, and faith communities all agree that the time has come to pass comprehensive immigration reform.
Real reform means strong border security, and we can build on the progress my Administration has already made – putting more boots on the southern border than at any time in our history, and reducing illegal crossings to their lowest levels in 40 years.
Real reform means establishing a responsible pathway to earned citizenship – a path that includes passing a background check, paying taxes and a meaningful penalty, learning English, and going to the back of the line behind the folks trying to come here legally.
And real reform means fixing the legal immigration system to cut waiting periods, reduce bureaucracy, and attract the highly-skilled entrepreneurs and engineers that will help create jobs and grow our economy. “”
BIll Clinton 1995 State Of the Union
“” All Americans, not only in the states most heavily affected, but in every place in this country, are rightly disturbed by the large numbers of illegal aliens entering our country. The jobs they hold might otherwise be held by citizens or legal immigrants. The public service they use impose burdens on our taxpayers. That’s why our administration has moved aggressively to secure our borders more by hiring a record number of new border guards, by deporting twice as many criminal aliens as ever before, by cracking down on illegal hiring, by barring welfare benefits to illegal aliens.
In the budget I will present to you we will try to do more to speed the deportation of illegal aliens who are arrested for crimes, to better identify illegal aliens in the workplace as recommended by the commission headed by former Congresswoman Barbara Jordan.
We are a nation of immigrants. But we are also a nation of laws. It is wrong and ultimately self-defeating for a nation of immigrants to permit the kind of abuse of our immigration laws we have seen in recent years, and we must do more to stop it. “”
Amazing, its ok for tough immigration laws by these past Democrats that were president, but Trump can’t !.
I don;t agree with these children being separated, but we also need to review what past president have said on immigration and their failure to act.
Daniel Floyd says
It appears that most posters here are clueless. This law at the boarder has been in effect for the prior 2 administrations. They refused to enforce it so the boarder has been overrun since. Nice! Not 1 child who’s parent asked for asylum legally has been separated from that parent. NOT 1!. The smugglers played on your emotion, and they sent thousands of unaccompanied minors to the boarder. They are not with a parent (in most cases). They know that the media would play to their sympathies and you all fell for it. The only children who have been separated are the one’s who’s parent (s) broke the law. What would you do with them? Put them in the same cell. Stop listening to the sob stories from the media who are all to eager to say bad things about Trump and start listening to the facts for once.
Sherry says
Dear Capt. Here is the nut of the nut. We’ve needed “comprehensive” immigration reform for decades now. Our current laws are a tangled mess, making it impossible for many to immigrate LEGALLY. . . and “CONGRESS” has NOT stepped up to FIX ANYTHING. Take a good read :
Immigration 101: Why Can’t Immigrants Just “Get Legal”, “Get in Line” and Get Their Papers?
by America’s Voice on July 25, 2017
Here’s a basic question we often come across: why can’t undocumented immigrants just “get in line”, “get legal”, “get right with the law” — i.e. obtain the legalization and citizenship that would allow them to become full-fledged Americans and protect them from deportation?
The short answer is: they can’t.
One misconception about undocumented immigration is that obtaining legal papers is as simple as, say, changing your address at the post office, and that immigrants remain undocumented due to a lack of trying. But nothing could be further from the truth.
In fact, there are millions of immigrants who have lived in the US for decades, who have worked hard and paid taxes and bought homes, who have US-citizen children, who make valuable community contributions — who have been deported, and forcibly separated from their whole lives in America, because they weren’t able to “get legal”. Many of them have spent years and tens of thousands or more in legal fees trying to find pathways to legalization and citizenship for themselves. If there were a way to “get right with the law”, they would have done it. There isn’t.
As immigration attorney David Leopold wrote at Medium recently:
Immigration law generally requires that for an immigrant to adjust or change status to temporary worker or green card holder, he or she must have lawfully entered the United States…immigrants who entered the country without inspection — even as young children — generally cannot apply for a green card [while] inside the United States under any circumstances, including if they marry a U.S. citizen.
The question of why immigrants come to the US without papers, from a logistical standpoint, boils down to two things: the fact that there’s no “line” for the vast majority of people around the world to get into, and the fact that there’s no way to correct undocumented status.
Why don’t immigrants just get in line? There is no line
As the American Immigration Council explained, there is no single “line” for would-be immigrants to come into the United States. People can visit, of course, using tourist or student visas. But immigration, the process that leads to a green card, legal permanent residency, and/or American citizenship, is not an option for the vast majority of people living around the world.
Generally speaking, there are only three paths through which people can immigrate*:
Employer-based immigration
For an employer to sponsor a foreign worker to come to the US, the worker must generally have a job lined up with an eligible employer who will sponsor them. This typically requires advanced skills and longtime professional experience, and is used to bring in scientists, professors, and multinational executives. This type of visa can only be used for a limited number of foreign workers, and the worker must stay with the employer who sponsored them — which has led to many reports of exploitation and abuse by employers. There are also temporary, seasonal visas for agricultural workers — but there are also very limited in number, onerous to obtain, and costly for employers.
Family-based immigration
US citizens can petition for their spouses, parents, children, and siblings to join them in the United States. (Legal permanent residents can petition for spouses and unmarried children.) But there are lines for each of these. According to the American Immigration Council, the unmarried children of US citizens must wait more than 5 years to be able to come to the US, while siblings of US citizens must wait more than ten years. The website continues:
People from countries with high levels of immigration to the United States–Mexico, China, India, and the Philippines — generally have longer waiting times. For example, married children of US citizens from Mexico must wait more than 20 years for a visa to become available, and Filipino siblings of US citizens currently wait about 25 years.
And if a person seeking to immigrate does not have a close family tie in the US in the first place, they are ineligible for this route.
Asylum
Each year, the US sets a limit on how many refugees will be admitted for humanitarian reasons. This year, the cap was a mere 50,000, and was reached in June. To be admitted as refugees, individuals must be screened by multiple international and U.S. agencies and prove that they have a “well-founded fear of persecution” in their home country “based on race, religion, membership in a particular social group, political opinion, or national origin.” An immigrant does not qualify as a refugee or an asylee because of poverty or difficult economic conditions in their home country. This is also a very difficult path to entry — untold numbers of immigrants have been deported because they came to the US seeking asylum and had their cases denied, in many cases because it is almost impossible to prove that one’s life is in direct danger. Furthermore, the Trump Administration is now reportedly turning away asylum applicants at the border, in violation of international law.
Why can’t immigrants already in the US “get legal”? There’s no way
All of the above explains why would-be immigrants to the US generally have no legal way to come. For undocumented immigrants already in the US, the situation is not much different. Even in the many, many cases where undocumented immigrants have been in the US for decades, married, had US citizen children, worked and paid taxes, started businesses and bought homes, there is no way to obtain legal status.
An undocumented person already in the US could be sponsored by a US-citizen child — but the child must first be 21 years of age or older, and the undocumented parent would still have to get into the long family-based immigration lines mentioned above, resulting in a wait of 20 years or longer.
A person could marry a US citizen, but this does not necessarily lead to legal status either. As we explained here, an undocumented person who seeks legalization by marriage must leave the US first and return to their country of origin. But once they identify themselves as undocumented and leave, they trigger a ban — that can last up to 10 years — during which they cannot reenter the country. There are ways around this ban, but only for a select group of people.
Agkistrodon says
Didn’t they call Barry the Deporter in Chief?……..And this has been happening for over 11 years, and many of the photos are from 5 years ago…Way to use pawns though, I like the “pulling at the heart strings” angle. maybe I can manage a few tears.
REDPILLED says
“Ve Vere only following orders.” Where have we heard this before?
Richard says
I will use a phrase previously posted by Common Sense except for a minor substitution, “Arguing with a Trump Hater is like arguing with a four year old”. You can’t believe anyone on the left as they all lie nor can you believe anyone on the right as they all lie too. So who can you believe, CNN? ROTFLMAO
capt says
the key to everything your wrote or quoted is “” must have lawfully entered the United States”. Its that simple, enter legally and the US is open to you.
Sherry says
Dear Capt,
Did you even take the time to read the information I posted? They CANNOT just get in line. . . there is NO reasonable way to become LEGAL!
Also, you are not taking into account the illegal immigrants that were brought to our country as very young children, and know NO other home. . . DACA.
Or, those that were enticed to come illegally (and even brought illegally), or over stay “temporary” visas by thousands of US Companies who want cheap labor. . . like Walmart. Often those workers are paid less than minimum wage and actually abused because they CANNOT complain to the authorities. Take a good read:
https://www.texastribune.org/2016/12/19/big-name-businesses-exploit-immigrant-labor/
There are over 44 MILLION undocumented workers in our country. . . who have NO reasonable way of becoming legal.. Most are cleaning toilets, picking crops, etc. at less than minimum wage with ZERO benefits and the “employers” are NOT being held accountable.
It is just NOT THAT SIMPLE!
Sherry says
Refugee children are being abused in a detention camp in Virginia! This just in from the AP:
WASHINGTON (AP) — Immigrant children as young as 14 housed at a juvenile detention center in Virginia say they were beaten while handcuffed and locked up for long periods in solitary confinement, left nude and shivering in concrete cells.
The abuse claims against the Shenandoah Valley Juvenile Center near Staunton, Virginia, are detailed in federal court filings that include a half-dozen sworn statements from Latino teens jailed there for months or years. Multiple detainees say the guards stripped them of their clothes and strapped them to chairs with bags placed over their heads.
“Whenever they used to restrain me and put me in the chair, they would handcuff me,” said a Honduran immigrant who was sent to the facility when he was 15 years old. “Strapped me down all the way, from your feet all the way to your chest, you couldn’t really move. … They have total control over you. They also put a bag over your head. It has little holes; you can see through it. But you feel suffocated with the bag on.”
In addition to the children’s first-hand, translated accounts in court filings, a former child-development specialist who worked inside the facility independently told The Associated Press this week that she saw kids there with bruises and broken bones they blamed on guards. She spoke on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to publicly discuss the children’s cases.
Sherry says
AND. . . a law suit has been filed saying immigrant children are being FORCEFULLY DRUGGED at a Texas detention center. . . this from The Hill:
A lawsuit made public on Wednesday alleges that immigrant children held at a detention center near Houston were forcibly administered drugs.
Immigrant children at Shiloh Treatment Center, a government contractor that houses unaccompanied migrant kids, were held down and told they would not be able to see their parents unless they took the psychiatric drugs, according to documents filed April in U.S. District Court in California.
“The supervisor told me I was going to get a medication injection to calm me down,” a young girl told attorneys, according to Reveal News. “Two staff grabbed me, and the doctor gave me the injection despite my objection and left me there on the bed.”
The court documents also say that workers administering the drugs at the center told children that some of the pills were vitamins. According to filings, one child said “the staff told me that some of the pills are vitamins because they think I need to gain weight. The vitamins changed about two times, and each time I feel different.”
One child was given a variety of drugs, including seizure medications, antipsychotic and antidepressant drugs, and the Parkinson’s medication known as Benztropine.
Children said the drugs had negative effects on them, including leaving them unable to walk, fatigued, and fearing other people.
The Hill has reached out to Shiloh Treatment Center and the Office of Refugee Resettlement for comment.
The documents were filed in connection with a pending class-action lawsuit against Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the Trump administration that alleges poor treatment of migrant children being held in federally run facilities, Reveal reported.
Richard says
Stated by Media Bias/Fact Check – Quote “The Hill covers both sides on the political spectrum and generally sources information properly, however they sometimes rush stories and have to change them after the fact. The Hill rarely uses loaded words in their headlines and articles such as this: Trump says he won’t sign GOP’s compromise immigration bill. All news stories are sourced to either journalists in the field or credible media sources. Story selection slightly favors the left, but is generally balanced. A factual search reveals The Hill has not failed any fact checks. However, it should be noted that they have rushed to publish breaking news that needed to be corrected or removed in past. The Hill always corrects factual errors in a timely manner and therefore maintain a high factual record.
Overall, we rate The Hill slightly Left-Center biased based on story selection and High for factual reporting. (5/18/2016) Updated (D. Van Zandt 6/15/2018)
Sherry says
Geez! The words directly from court filings are FACTS no matter which news outlet reports them.
I could not find where FOX reported on either of these stories. . . soooooo, what does that tell you all about bias? Or, could it be that any FACTUAL news from an outlet other than FOX is deemed to be fake? Really?
Richard says
OMG!
https://www.facebook.com/RealBrittHughes/videos/1917669954922710/
gmath55 says
Good point Richard. People on here complaining about the children aka crying need a Reality Check!
They didn’t care about the children when Obama had them locked in cages. Now they do? What about the American homeless children. Do the Democrats care about American children. NO!
Sherry says
Internationally somehow they reported on the abuse of children in detention camps. . . you trump supports must be soooo proud. For example, this is how we look in France:
http://www.businessinsider.fr/us/migrant-children-forcibly-drugged-abused-in-us-government-detention-2018-6
I guess this is the great. . . despicable, deplorable, disgusting, horrific. . . America you wanted.
Agkistrodon says
If Sherry says her “facts” are true, they gotta be right?……….
Agkistrodon says
I can cite several “so-called” credible internet sources that have articles stating there are dolphins in Lake Michigan. I can assure you there are NO dolphins in Lake Michigan.
Sherry says
Since actual “court filings” are not respected as factual, and I don’t suffer “complete fools” gladly, I’ll not comment further on this thread. Enjoy the FOX and Facebook Koolaid!
Makeitso1701 says
Sherry, facts don’t matter to these trumpsters, if God himself came down from heaven and told trump fans what miserable excuse for a human being trump is, they would call God a liar and fake news.
Just like when trump said in one of his speeches,” I could shoot somebody on Fifth Avenue and not lose one vote”. trumpsters don’t care about truth, that’s why they are 24/7 tuned to Fox fake news.
Agkistrodon says
So your point is our courts have NOT been infiltrated by BIAS. I can tell you with certainty, the US judicial system is filled with Political judges, which you might like, until you have a case and the judge, holds prejudice notions based on preconceived OPINIONS. So no, your cited case are worth bubkis, which if you don’t know what that is, bubkiss is goat pooh.
gmath55 says
Some people are delusional! Fox news is fake? Fox news is rated number one with the most viewers! I’m sure CNN is fake and I heard they are going off the air due to low ratings. But, you live in your make believe world.
https://www.scribd.com/document/375453082/Basic-Cable-Ranker-1Q-18-Total-Viewers#from_embed
mausborn says
Putin attacked America and he will continue to do so. He is our enemy.
Wow, those PEE tapes must really be something.